Surname Saturday: PAPE Cousin Bait - part 3

Martha Elisabeth Pape, 26 years old, about 1916 or 1917.
Photo by J. D. Toloff, Evanston, Ill.

For the past two Saturdays, I have shared a letter written by my great aunt Martha Elisabeth Pape Bleidt (1890-1980), my paternal grandfather's older sister, in 1969.  She sent it to a distant cousin, Lawrence Pape, who'd found me through this blog.

I learned something interesting about Aunt Martha while having lunch with my dad last Saturday.  She was quite a singer in her younger days, but a tonsillectomy damaged her vocal cords and ruined a potential career.

Aunt Martha's letter started out "Grandfather Pape [Jacob Pape, and his wife Elisabeth Gierse] had 4 sons:
John - Joseph - Anton - Lawrence."

The first two parts of the letter talked about Joseph and Anton.  The next part is about Lawrence (or Laurenz, as it is spelled in Germany, or Lorenz, as he apparently spelled it after coming to America).

Lorenz was the youngest of the four sons, born October 30, 1862, in Bödefeld, Westphalia, Germany.  Sometime in or before 1889, he married his first wife, Maria Henrietta Kamp, who died sometime between 1896 and 1899.  As it says below, they had six children:

Transcription:  "Your grandfather Lawrence Pape had two wives.  Your grandfather and his first wife had six children.  Karl, Joseph, Ewald.  These are your uncles.  August - your father.  Marie and Nellie.  These are your aunts.  Your grandfather and his second wife had two children, Margaret (your Aunt) and Lawrence (your uncle who lives in Germany).  If you write to your Uncle Ewald who lives at 7440 - 4th Place Downey Cal. 90241 he would be able to tell you all about your father's family."

Karl James (1889-1958), Joseph John Anton (1891-1936), Maria/Mary [Mrs. Herman Walter] (1892-1977), August Peter (1893-1947), Ewald Theodore (1894-1976), and Petronella "Nellie" [Mrs. George Arendt] (1896-1930), were all born in Düsseldorf, Germany.

By 1899, Lorenz had married again, a Maria Brauman, and had two more children:  Lorenz Jr. (1899-1977), and Margaret "Grete" [Mrs. Louis Travaglini and Mrs. Arthur Hammes] (1901-1988), were also born in Düsseldorf.

Lorenz, Karl, and August arrived in Boston on May 27, 1913, aboard the Marquette out of Antwerp, Belgium.  Joseph, Maria, Ewald, and Nellie arrived later that year, on December 4, in New York, aboard the Friedrich Der Grosse.  They all went to stay with my great-grandfather, John Pape, at his home at 1043 Sherman Avenue in Evanston, Illinois.

The following year, the family is listed in the 1914 Evanston City Directory as living at 1622 Forest Avenue in Wilmette.  Lorenz, Karl, and August are all painters.  In June 1917, the family is still at this address, according to the World War I draft registration cards of Karl, Joseph, August (who all work for Lorenz) and Ewald (who works as a millman for Evanston Labor Co.).

Sometime between June 1917 and May 1919, Lorenz, Karl, Maria, Ewald, and Nellie moved to Wisconsin.  Joseph and August both married Chicago-area girls (in 1918 and 1919 respectively) and stayed in Wilmette, operating the painting/decorating business.

Maria married German immigrant Herman Walter (of Nekoosa as of 1917) on May 27, 1919, in Nekoosa, Wisconsin.  Lorenz is on the 1920 census in nearby Port Edwards, owning his own farm, with sons Karl and Ewald and daughter Petronella.  She married Illinois native George Arendt (who'd been in Wisconsin since at least 1910) in Nekoosa on May 18 of that year.  By December 11, 1920, Ewald is in Fort Logan, Colorado.   An article in the March 18, 1921, Wisconsin Rapids Daily Tribune states, "Lawrence Pape was among the German Settlement residents who visited in Nekoosa on business Thursday."

However, by July 2, 1923, Lorenz and Karl are apparently back in Wilmette, Illinois, according to the passenger list for the arrival of his youngest daughter Grete from Germany that day.  Karl and Ewald both married Illinois girls later that year, but in Ewald's case, the marriage took place in Vancouver, Washington, and he moved to Portland, Oregon, shortly thereafter, where he had a successful architectural career. (Interestingly, half-brother Lorenz Jr, who stayed in Germany with his mother, was also an architect, in Solingen.)  Like his other brothers and father before him, Karl was a painter and decorator.

Daughter Nellie's July 28, 1930, obituary indicates Lorenz Sr. was living in Chicago, but I could not find him anywhere on the census that year.  He died March 23, 1932, following six weeks of illness with pneumonia, at the home of his daughter Mary in Nekoosa, Wisconsin, and is buried in Sacred Heart (Riverside) Cemetery there.

© Amanda Pape - 2013 - click here to e-mail me.